Ubuntu will officially be the first Linux distribution offered by Dell

Once Dell confirmed that it would offer the Linux operating system on select PCs in the future, Linux enthusiasts anxiously awaited the announcement of which Linux distributions would be offered. Dell today announced that it would preinstall the Ubuntu operating system on some PC and notebook models.

Along with appealing to popular demand, the computer company will likely save money by stripping out the cost of purchasing the operating system license from Microsoft. It appears that OS support would be provided by the open source and Linux communities, while Dell would exclusively provide hardware support.

Michael Dell previously disclosed that he has Ubuntu installed on his personal laptop.

Dell has not announced models, configurations or prices of PCs and notebooks that will feature Ubuntu. Dell also did not eliminate the possibility of other Linux distributions being installed on future product lines.

Linux fans hope that Dell embracing Linux will begin a shift in which more PC vendors will switch to open source technology.

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You're just used to using Windows for over a decade. Put a completely computer illiterate person in front of a Windows box and see how intuitive it really is, see how far they get. Put that same person in front of a Linux box with Gnome or KDE and I bet it will be just as intuitive as Windows to them. I know cause I've experimented with this idea on my own family.

You have just touched on one of the fundamental truths. Linux is not Windows and it's not supposed to be Windows. Therefore, everything will not be the same. I don't see Windows as being any more intuitive than any of the three mainstream Linux distos I'm playing with (Ubuntu, FC6 and Suse 10.2). It's just the fact that most people are used to using Windows so when anything else is set in front of them, they don't know what to do.

Why do you think MS has never truly had a problem with people pirating their OSes? Even if the person doesn't pay for the OS MS wins. The person learns how to use Windows and probably won't want to switch to anything else since it's what they are used to. Pirating the OS doesn't directly put money in MS's pocket, but it does indirectly as it helps stifle the competition from other OSes keeping their virtual monopoly of the mainstream user OS base.

What I don't understand is why people seem to think they will be able to sit down in front of a Linux system and expect to know everything about it considering they have never used one before. I don't see too many people going from XP to Vista and knowing everything about Vista the first time they use it. It's not going to happen and that's going from one iteration of Windows to another.

If someone truly wants to learn a Linux distro, they can. Google is your friend. I've had a lot of "problems" and google has helped me out on every one of them so far. I do know a bit more than your average computer user so it's a little easier for me. However, I also have a computer setup that's a lot different from the average user. Not too many of your average Joes are going to have to worry about having five different hard drives with a total of around twelve partitions covering three different file systems to manage. This is my current setup and I'm learning how to set it up properly so I have use of everything I have.

One difference between me and most people is I love to tinker and I love to figure out or find a solution to a problem. It's in this way I have gathered the knowledge I have and I'm normally able to pass it on to others to help them.

Linux isn't for everyone. Neither is Windows of any flavor or OSX or OS/2 or any of the myriads of operating systems out there. After a few months, I have found I prefer a 64 bit Linux distro with 32 bit libraries for most of my computing needs. I do the vast majority of my computing using Suse 10.2 with an occasional foray into Windows for a game that won't run or run decent under Wine. Luckily my favored game runs in Linux natively since it's based on the Quake 3 engine.